


first encounters (aren't always the best)

by sunnyjeno



Category: NCT (Band)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Bookstore, Alternate Universe - Coffee Shops & Cafés, Awkwardness, First Meetings, M/M, basically i just wanted to write moody doyoung, soft johnny
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-09-17
Updated: 2018-09-17
Packaged: 2019-07-13 11:12:52
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,748
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16016726
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sunnyjeno/pseuds/sunnyjeno
Summary: Johnny is an avid romance reader, but the universe seems to be messing with him when it comes to a certain black-haired stranger.or,Johnny is a hopeless romantic and Doyoung just wants some damn peace.





	first encounters (aren't always the best)

" _ When my arms wrap you round I press _ ," Johnny recites under his breath, eyes glued to the poetry book he found in some shelf, " _ My heart upon the loveliness, _ " he maneuvers around the historical fiction shelves, and the magazine stand, the path to his destination a clear, straight line in his mind. " _ That has long faded from the wor-- _ "

 

Johnny's words are interrupted when his body hits another body, managing to drop the other's books. Johnny reaches down to help the man, stopping to read the title. "Experimental Psychology: Understanding Psychological Research." It’s rare to see someone get textbooks from this store.

 

"Hey bigfoot, you done staring at my books? Look, I've got a huge test coming up in three days, so give me that back and next time try to not walk around with your nose shoved inside some yellowing pages. Okay? Okay."

 

The man (Johnny doesn't catch his name, the human hurricane walks away before he can even begin to apologize) pulls the book away from Johnny's hands, and exits the bookstore, effectively taking Johnny's breath away.

 

"Please don't stare at the door with that starstruck look. He called you bigfoot." Jaehyun is sitting behind the register, a Don Wilson in hand. His glasses are almost slipping off his nose, but he pushes them back fiercely, like he’s trying to win some fight with them.

 

“I’m not, I’m not staring at the door in any kind of way, much less awestruck or starstruck or whatever you said.” Johnny huffs and leans against the comic wall, the open door letting sunshine in to his right.

 

“Sure,” Jaehyun flips the page of his book, not bothering to look at Johnny, “knowing you, you’re already fantasizing of some kind of love-at-first-sight story.”

 

Johnny doesn’t bother answering, and instead helps himself to one of the disposable cups, pouring some cheap coffee from the outdated coffee machine near the back. Their bookstore is strange. The newer books are always piled in front of the storefront, right where Jaehyun usually stands. They’re pristinely organized every morning, the colorful young adult stories surrounding Jae. From then on, the bookstore feels like a storage room. There are books on top of books and it’s (for once) ok to squeeze yourself into the smallest crevices of the shelves, looking for a hidden treasure between the parched papers. There is a smell of time gone by, and the books date back to fifty or sixty years back. How they stay intact, Johnny has yet to discover, but there is some kind of strange magic around the entire place. There isn’t much light, the windows covered by some paint announcing an ice cream parlor that has since disappeared. Under the eyes of anyone who lives at a fast pace, the bookstore is just some strange nook of open doors and cheap coffee smell.

 

Johnny isn’t someone who lives in such way, though. He spends every thursday afternoon and well into the evening inside the store, shaking off dust from outdated encyclopedia tomes and chatting with the owner’s son, the same who mocked him just minutes ago.

 

“I was just interested. It’s weird to see new faces around here. Seriously, you’re handsome and all, full homo Jae you’re beautiful, but man, I get tired of seeing your wrinkly old face all the time.”

 

“I’m younger than you.”

 

Johnny sips his coffee, locking eyes with Jaehyun. “And you frown more than me.”

 

He has half the mind not to laugh when Jaehyun throws him (and misses) a pebble.

 

\--

 

It’s saturday morning and the sun is of a pale hue, clouds covering it with the threat of rain. Johnny is thankful for the weather, and for not forgetting his umbrella, but he still aches for a warm cup of coffee from his usual place. Like every saturday morning, he gets there at 7 a.m., greets Ten and Kun who are working the shop with half-lidded eyes that are soon to sparkle with enthusiasm, and takes a seat near the window on the far right, where the street opens up to more than another building. Then he sits for thirty minutes—Kun told him that that way the coffee is fresh, but there’s less chance of Ten or him screwing up his order (not that Johnny thinks they will, since he orders the same thing each time)—book raised right in front of him, and finally goes up to the counter to order when the clock hits 7:30 a.m.

 

“One iced americano with one spoonful of honey, and a chocolate-filled croissant, warmed.” Ten makes a point of saying it exactly at the same time as him, much to Johnny’s embarrassment. Is he really that predictable?

 

He turns around, deep in thoughts, and fails to notice the sleepy, skinnier frame that is about to collide with his. That is, of course, until Johnny has crashed with him, iced coffee staining both of their sweaters.

 

“I’m sorry, I wasn’t- Oh for fuck’s sake, you again? What is it with you, you… you blind moose!” Johnny would have laughed if it wasn’t for the quickly reddening face of the other. “Do you not know what paying attention to your surroundings is?”

 

Johnny stands there, mouth opening and closing, and feels once again as if all words had left his brain and moved to Timbuktu.

 

“I’m sorry, I didn’t mean—I’ll buy you a coffee?” Johnny really hopes the cheesy line he learned from some drama he watched past twelve works, but if the way Psychology Guy is still alternating between glaring at him and looking down to his pink sweater in near pain is any way to go by, it doesn’t seem like it’ll work.

 

“No, you absolute dickwit, I don’t want any of your damn coffee, I want my goddamn espresso and to go home and change from the outfit  **you** ruined.” And once again, the human hurricane is storming out, leaving Johnny and his forest sweater to stand there, amidst the mismatched couches, chairs, and tables, and the smell of coffee grains and mint. The warm yellow of the walls felt, for once, not cozy or playful, but rather blinding, as Johnny cast his eyes down.

 

“Ouch.” Ten is cleaning one of the cups from behind the counter, but he still makes sure to comment on that. “Not the way you expected your rom-com to go, huh?”

 

“Does everyone just assume that me reading romance novels means I have an obsession with the cliche love stories?”

 

“Johnny, last week you called us crying because you thought you had met your  _ soulmate  _ while buying groceries. At 12 am, if I may add.” Kun sighs, takes away the cup from Ten (who is pouting now), and pours himself a black.

 

“Well, yeah, but that was  _ last week _ . I’m a changed man.”

 

“The only thing you should change is your sweater.”

 

\--

 

On monday noons Johnny takes the 12:40 train. He gets to the station at 12:25 and greets Jeno, the kid who sits and plays guitar there until 1 p.m. At 12:35, he sits near the benches where he knows he’ll be boarding. He sits there until he hears the train approaching, and then he stands up to dust some kind of imaginary dirt off him, just because it’s a habit.

 

Normally, when the clock hit 12:42, Johnny would be in his seat, headphones in, listening to some podcast he found about classical literature. Normally, said podcast would last 28 minutes, so that by 1:10 p.m. when they reached his stop, Johnny could get off and get to work with ten minutes of spare. But today, it was 12:42, and Johnny was helping a familiar head of black hair up from the ground.

 

“I’m so, so sorry, I thought I was going to miss the train, I didn’t mean to run into you.” The Psychology Guy wouldn’t look up, which explained the lack of hostility in his voice. 

 

Johnny spoke up, for once, with a pleasant laugh. “It’s only fair you get to run me over, especially after the amount of times I’ve bumped into you.”

 

Psychology guy’s eyes raised quickly, and he slapped Johnny’s hands off his shoulder, a hardened expression replacing his previously surprised one. He gave Johnny a courteous “Right, thank you,” and moved to sit, the opposite side from Johnny’s usual seat.

 

“Wait,” Johnny stops him, and almost immediately punches himself because he’s doing the infamous ‘k-drama wrist grab,’ but he powers through with only a pink tint coloring his ears. “Can I please ask you a question? Other than this one I mean.”

 

The black-haired male seems to consider it for a few seconds, but then he nods. “Only if I get to ask one back. And if we sit down.”

 

Johnny glances at his phone screen, 12:50 glaring at him, and takes a seat in front of Psychology. “Ok, you go first then.”

 

“No. I said I get to ask one back. So you need to ask first.”

 

“Can we, can we just say it both at the same time?”

 

“Fine. On the count of three, I count.” Johnny notes that Psychology has a tendency to come off as harsh. “...3”

 

“Can I have your number?”

“Why are you stalking me?”

 

“Wait, what?” Johnny frowns, confused at the sudden accusation. “What makes you think I would stalk you?”

 

“Well, you keep showing up everywhere I go!”

 

“I,” Johnny pauses to take in the situation, and to calm down the laugh that he wants to let out. “I’ve lived in this neighborhood for the past five years, and I always go to the same places, same time, same day. You’re the one who randomly showed up and called me a bigfoot, a blind moose and a dickwit.”

 

Psychology is silent for a few seconds, and then he lets out the tiniest whisper of “...I didn’t really mean that.”

 

Johnny gives him an honest smile, checking his phone for the time, and stands up. “I sure hope you didn’t.” He starts making his way towards his usual seat, since his exit is that way either way, when the other stops him.

 

“Wait. What’s your name?”

 

“Johnny.” He is putting his headphones in, and the train’s doors are opening, but he hears the last few words before he gets off.

 

“I’m Doyoung. And I’ll answer your question… maybe wednesday? At the bookstore?”

 

For once, Johnny doesn’t mind the schedule change.

  
  



End file.
